The Marechaussee does not disclose the identity of the Americans, but according to the Chinese human rights organization ChinaAid, it concerns Michael Horowitz and Devra Marcus. Horowitz was a key aide to President Ronald Reagan.
The American couple is incarcerated. The Kazakh family that was accompanied by the Americans is entering the asylum procedure. According to ChinaAid, it concerns the wife and children of Kazakh activist Serikzjan Bilash. The human rights organization claims that the authorities of Kazakhstan labeled Serikzjan Bilash a terrorist and imprisoned him for a while in 2019. He is said to have denounced the situation of Kazakhs and Uyghurs in concentration camps in the Chinese province of Xinjiang. According to ChinaAid, the activist left Kazakhstan in 2019 and has been living separately from his family ever since.
Call for release
Bob Fu, chairman of ChinaAid, called on the Dutch government on Twitter to release the American couple immediately. He called the arrests unjustified and said the couple should be rewarded for their efforts to save a Kazakh family.
Violence broke out on a large scale in Kazakhstan last week. This happened after a sharp increase in fuel prices. At first the protests were peaceful, but the atmosphere changed. Protesters stormed government buildings in Almaty, the largest city in the country, among other things. According to the authorities, nearly 8,000 people have been arrested because of the unrest. The Central Asian country’s foreign ministry says Islamist extremists were involved in the disturbances.